There’s no real hope of me feeling remotely festive until work finishes on Friday but here’s a second Christmas song for this weekend- ‘cos nothing says Christmas like old-school hip hop, Adidas tracksuits and gold chains. Run DMC, all the way from 1987, sampling Clarence Carter’s Back Door Santa. ‘It’s Christmas time in Hollis, Queens, Mum’s cooking chicken and collard greens’.

Today we turn our attention towards footwear. A good outfit starts with the shoes, and works its way up. Mr Charity Shop Chic recommended Angels Want To Wear My Red Shoe by Elvis Costello. I was thinking of this, one of hip hop’s earliest examples of product placement (and earning Run DMC a lifetime supply as well). Run DMC didn’t wear the Kopenhagen pictured above- the shelltoe (or Superstar) were their thing, wide laced. The Kopenhagen and other city trainers were much more of a UK, terrace culture thing. I don’t often wear trainers anymore outside sporting activity but have owned multiple pairs of Adidas in the past. Trainer fetishism is widespread in the north-west. Trainers mind- I have noted a worrying trend developing, people in Britain calling trainers sneakers. Ugh.

If sir or madam requires something else less sportswear oriented for your feet, here’s Elvis Costello with his Attractions on Top Of The Pops in 1977.

According to The Guardian’s fashion desk band t-shirts are currently at various degrees of hipness. The ubiquitous Ramones t-shirt has peaked- wear at your peril. This is due to the large number of kids wearing them and it’s availability in Primark. The Stone Roses t-shirt is also in trouble, again due to their popularity with toddlers/their parents. Too cute y’see. On the other hand Raymond Pettibone’s illustration for Sonic Youth’s 1990 Goo album is always hot and currently having a bit of a moment. But top of the pops and hot to trot is the 80s classic, the Run DMC shirt. Which is funny because I nearly bought one for my daughter a couple of weeks when I chanced upon one in TK Maxx- but didn’t. If I’d bought it, for a child no less, an almost eleven year old, I could have killed the whole scene dead there and then. Anyway, I’m sure you’ll thank me (and The Guardian) for this advice- I wouldn’t want you getting it wrong out there and with band t-shirts, as Run DMC might say, it’s tricky.

A slight interruption in the Creation Records run. I’m the oldest of five brothers (there’s two sisters as well. That makes eight. Count ’em. Nightmare sometimes I can tell you. Though not the ones who read this blog obviously). The next one down from me, Z, is forty today. He was into hip hop, graffiti and breakdancing from the start. He’s still into it now (well, maybe not the breakdancing. And the judge put him straight about the graffiti), the oldest B-Boy in town. Why? Because it’s like that, and that’s the way it is.